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H H PPP CCC UK NATIONAL HPC SERVICE
H H P P C C --------------------------
HHHHH PPP C x x provided by
H H P C C xx EPCC and
H H P CCC x x CCLRC Daresbury Laboratory
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HPCx User Mailing 026 14 November 2003
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Contents
** TeraGyroid Exercise - reminder of downtime
** HPCx course: Optimisation techniques for the Power4 processor
** HPCx Users' group meeting
** New versions of software
** Globus certificates
** "Capability Computing"
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Greetings--
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TERAGYROID EXERCISE - REMINDER OF DOWNTIME
A reminder that the service will be unavailable for the whole of
Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday next week, November 18-20. This is to
enable us to run the major exercise under the TeraGroid project, as
discussed in our mailing of 24 October.
The final practice session will be on Saturday, 15 November,
16:00-22:00.
Our thanks to everyone for their cooperation with this project.
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HPCx COURSE: OPTIMISATION TECHNIQUES FOR THE POWER4 PROCESSOR
Tuesday, 9 December.
This course will focus on tools and techniques for single processor
optimisation on HPCx. The course will cover the architecture of the
processors and memory system, profiling and hardware counter tools,
getting the best from the compilers and Power4-specific tips and
tricks. There will be hands-on sessions in addition to lecture
material.
Registration form:
http://www.hpcx.ac.uk/support/training/form.html
The course will take place at Daresbury Laboratory in the same week as
the HPCx Annual Seminar, and the Machine Evaluation workshop. There
are still places available on this course - however, we will be unable
to accept registrations after Monday, 1 December.
Annual Seminar:
http://www.hpcx.ac.uk/about/events/annual2003/
Machine evaluation workshop:
http://www.cse.clrc.ac.uk/disco/mew14.shtml
How to get to the Daresbury Laboratory:
http://www.cclrc.ac.uk/Activity/ACTIVITY=DLMaps;
Hotels in the area:
http://www.cse.clrc.ac.uk/disco/mew14/hotels.html
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HPCx USERS' GROUP MEETING
Wednesday, 10 December
This is a chance for users to bring their concerns and problems
directly to the senior management of HPCx, who will be present. The
meeting will follow immediately after the Annual Seminar. We hope
that people will want to discuss issues that have arisen during the
Seminar. In many cases it will be possible to take decisions on the
spot to respond to these.
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NEW VERSIONS OF SOFTWARE
NAMD
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Version 2.5 of the molecular dynamics code NAMD is now available for
general use. NAMD is intended to investigate large biomolecular
systems. Initial benchmarking on HPCx indicates a substantial
improved performance over the previous version 2.4, which remains
available.
Users who already have access to version 2.4 can access the new
version as:
/usr/local/packages/namd/bin/namd2-5
Other people who wish to use this code should contact the helpdesk:
support@hpcx.ac.uk
HPM Toolkit
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Version 2.5.2 of the HPM toolkit is now available. The HPM toolkit is
an important performance optimisation tool, which allows the developer
to read the hardware counters of the CPU. For full information on how
to use and access the HPM toolkit, please refer the userguide:
http://www.hpcx.ac.uk/support/documentation/UserGuide/HPCxuser
As we mentioned last month, there is also a Technical Report: "Using
the Hardware Performance Monitor Toolkit on HPCx" by Joachim Hein.
You can find it here:
http://www.hpcx.ac.uk/research/hpc/technical_reports/HPCxTR0307/index.html
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GLOBUS CERTIFICATES
It's now possible to use the website to ask for a Globus Certificate
to be added to an account on HPCx. Here's how to do this.
- Login to the admin website in the usual way. If you haven't done
this for a while, you can find a description here:
http://www.hpcx.ac.uk/projects/FAQ/
- Scroll down the web page to panel headed "Your user accounts".
- Click on the "View" button against the account you want to add the
certificate to.
- Click the "Add" button in the "Globus Certificates" panel
- Enter the DN in the box and click "Submit"
A human being checks the submission before the certificate is added,
so there will be a short delay while this happens.
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"CAPABILITY COMPUTING"
The second edition of "Capability Computing", the HPCx newsletter,
will be mailed out today, Friday 14 November.
You can also get in in PDF format here:
http://www.hpcx.ac.uk/about/newsletter
Those receiving a paper copy should include everyone who was
registered on the website up to yesterday morning. If your copy
doesn't arrive, please let us know.
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Regards
--John
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Earlier mailings: http://www.hpcx.ac.uk/support/notices/index.html
To be removed from the mailing list: log into your website account,
go to the "Update" page, and click the "Opt out of user emails"
field; then click "Commit update".
--
John Fisher j.fisher@epcc.ed.ac.uk
HPCx User Administration and Helpdesk
HPCx: http://www.hpcx.ac.uk Helpdesk: support@hpcx.ac.uk
Phone: +44 131 650 5029 Fax: +44 131 650 6555